how to make scroll bar indicator more clear and easy to see?

Question

Using Submine test 3, build 3083 on windows 7.
Currently using Dawn.tm theme, selected from Preferences->Color themes

The only problem

Answer 1

What I do is change the color of the "mini map" to make the scroll control much more visible, as opposed to a lot of other solutions that recommend changing the color of the scrollbars themselves.

Here are some fantastic instructions that personally greatly helped me out: https://github.com/kujiy/how-to-change-sublime-minimap-color

You can create a theme override in your Sublime installation folder under Packages/User by creating a new directory named "theme_override" then creating a file named "your-theme-name.sublime-theme" and saving it with something like this:

[
    {
        "class": "minimap_control",
        "settings": ["always_show_minimap_viewport"],
        "viewport_color": [255, 255, 255],
        "viewport_opacity": 0.15,
    },
]

Answer 2

In your user folder you can override the themes properties you want. In this case there is a minor problem as the scrollbar texture (the image that contains the scrollbar with the top and bottom semicircles) is quite dark, so although you modify the tint you can't get a light color similar to white unless you change that texture (image).

So the solution I pruposse is to create two new images (horizontal and vertical scrollbar) that are lighter, set it in the theme preference overrides and then (optionally) set the tint color you want.

Step by step tutorial

1. Locate your sublime User folder (Packages/User). The Packages folder can be opened using the sublime menu Preferences>Browse Packages, inside is located the User folder.
2. Inside User folder create a directory called theme_override. We are going to place here all the files and settings of our theme that we want to override.
3. Inside this folder (theme_override) put this two images and name them scroll_puck.png and scroll_puck_horiz.png.

4. Inside theme_override, create a file with the name of your theme. If you are using the default theme the file should be named Default.sublime-theme. If you are not using the default theme you can see the name of the theme you are using in Settings>Preferences>theme, and then create a file with that name (for example Material-Theme-Darker.sublime-theme) inside theme_override Inside this new file place the following content:

   [    
       // More visible scrollbar
       {
           "class": "puck_control",
           "layer0.texture": "User/theme_override/scroll_puck.png",
           // Optional: set to your desired RGB color
           "layer0.tint": [40, 170, 250],
           "layer0.opacity": 1.0,
           "layer1.opacity": 0.0,
           "layer0.inner_margin": 2
       },
       {
           "class": "puck_control",
           "attributes": ["horizontal"],
           "layer0.texture": "User/theme_override/scroll_puck_horiz.png"
       }
   ]
   

5. Restart sublime text

6. Optional modify RGB color (no need to restart again).

EDIT: this is the result

EDIT: added basic info for people that are not using the default theme.

Note: if you are not using the default theme the results might change depending on the values that your theme overrides. If you want to know what values your theme is using, and you want to customize them, you can see them inside the .sublime-package file of your theme. For example, if you are using Material Theme open Material Theme.sublime-package (this is just a zip file) and inside there will be a file called Material-Theme-Darker.sublime-theme, you should not modify this file, but you can customize/override whatever you want using the file we have created in step 4.

Answer 3

You can customize you sublime text in a better way. Install a package through package control name Seti_UI. and customize your sublime. You can customize all of the Interface using Seti_UI. I customized my Sublime Text and have the following settings.

You can do it by your own. Go to -> Preferences -> Settings -> User defined settings and after installing the above mentioned Package.

"theme": "Seti.sublime-theme",
"caret_extra_width": 2,                 //  to have a wider/thicker caret
"caret_extra_bottom": 3,                //  to make the caret = to the line height (the theme currently support 0,3,5)
"caret_extra_top": 3,
"highlight_line": true,
"Seti_tabs_small": true,
"Seti_no_under_bar":true,
"Seti_yellow_tabclose": true,
"Seti_indigo_scrollbar": true,
"Seti_SB_med": true,
"Seti_sb_big_padding": true,
"Seti_bold_slctdfile_labels": true,
"Seti_sidebar_font_size_14": true,
"Seti_yellow_map": true,
"Seti_accent_lime": true,
"Seti_ClosedFolder_anim": true,
"Seti_teal_statusbar": true,
"Seti_panel_nrml": true,
"Seti_dark_fold_button": true,
"Seti_ClosedFolder_dots": true,
"Seti_sidebar_font_Fira": true,
"Seti_sidebar_font_Hack": true,
"Seti_bold_heading":true,              // make heading font in bold
"Seti_no_heading":true,                // remove the "folder,group 1,etc.."
"Seti_top_heading_big":true,           // sidebar top header img big
"Seti_top_heading_small":true,         // sidebar top header img small
"Seti_top_heading_anim" :true,          // sidebar top header img animate on hover
"Seti_alt_tree_row":true,      

Answer 4

This works nicely. However, the problem is that the "puck" only appears when you use the mouse to scroll up or down. When I try to grab the puck to scroll right, it disappears. We need a stable scrollbar as in most interfaces. This adjustment makes the scrollbars more stable:

{
    "class": "puck_control",
    "layer0.texture": "User/Theme - Default/vertical_white_scrollbar.png",
    "content_margin": [3, 4], //makes horiz scrollbar taller
    // Adjust RGB color. Optional: comment the following line (or set 255,255,255) to not modify image color
    "layer0.tint": [200, 170, 250]
},
{
    "class": "puck_control",
    "attributes": ["horizontal"],
    "content_margin": [3, 4], //makes horiz scrollbar taller
    "layer0.texture": "User/Theme - Default/horizontal_white_scrollbar.png"

}
{
    "class": "tab_label",
    "parents": [{"class": "tab_control", "attributes": ["selected"]}],
    //"fg": [30,30,30],
    "fg": [255,131,0] //change highlighted tab color
}

Derived from: Sublime Text 3 Hides scrollbars